Magnolia Springs Mobile Home Fire

By Debbie Williams Reporter

Investigators think Christmas decorations may have sparked a fire that left a Baldwin County family homeless. Magnolia Springs Mobile Home Fire

Published: Tue, December 18, 2007 - 5:00 pm Last Updated: Tue, December 18, 2007 - 7:10 pm

Debbie Williams

Investigators think Christmas decorations may have sparked a fire that left a Baldwin County family homeless.
The fire started early this morning in Magnolia Springs.
Little is left inside the mobile home that sits near the end of Sunray Court in Magnolia Springs. Phillip and Diane Klienpeter had been making a home there for themselves, her son and his girlfriend. "They lost everything cause where the fire started it got their bedroom right off the bat," say Diane.
The couple had planned to be married New Years Eve according to his uncle Jim Kleinschmidt, "Are they going to be able to get married what's going to happen?"
It was right around two o'clock in the morning when the Klienpeters woke to the sound of smoke alarms. They tried the bedroom door but were met with smoke and flames they're only way out was through that window. They escaped with very little. "What we got on. I got a pair of sweat pants and a pair of boots," says Phillip. "And I had a nightgown on," says Diane.
"If it hadn't been for the smoke detectors I don't think they would have made it." April Withers lives two doors down. "This close to Christmas it has got to be awful."
"It's hard anytime," according to Diane. Twenty years ago fire took another home but the timing of this one is what hurts most. "We pray we never have another one."
A family car was also killed in the fire. The Red Cross is helping the family for the next few days.